Whip Radio

I’ve been listening to more streaming radio recently, thanks to Resonance FM and Radio Aporee combined with a wish just to hear some good old radio even though my tuner died years ago and CBC Radio isn’t good any more.

It’s a bit of a pain to bookmark stations in a browser, though, and I use NoScript so the players never work without a bit of fiddling anyway. So I started to make a list of the URLs of the actual music streams, which are hidden in the web pages. If you know what to do you can use that URL to play the station without running a browser. Once I had a few of them I realized I should make a list, and the list turned into a script: Whip Radio. If you’re comfortable with a command line, you might like it.

It suits me, because I know what the stations are, but there are some improvements to be made, and I’ll do what I can. If it’s useful to anyone else, have at it.

If you’ve never heard Radio Aporee, do try it. It’s “a responsive stream of sound, a topographic radio that listens, that may (or may not…) recognise and react to events, e.g. new sound uploads, listeners tuning in, mobile app activity, live sessions, phone calls etc. it’s an ongoing experiment and exploration of affective geographies and new practices related to sound/art and radio.” A few minutes after you start listening you’ll probably hear a robot say someone in your area has started listening, and it’ll play a recording made near you.